Died in January

January 24, 41

Julia Drusilla (daughter of Caligula)
the only child and daughter of Roman Emperor Gaius and his fourth and last wife Milonia Caesonia.
One-year-old Julia Drusilla was assassinated along with her parents on 24 January 41

January 15, 69

Galba
Roman Emperor for seven months from 68 to 69.
Galba was the governor of Hispania Tarraconensis, and made a bid for the throne during the rebellion of Julius Vindex. He was the first emperor of the Year of the Four Emperors

January 13, 86

Gaius Marius
a Roman general and statesman.
He held the office of consul an unprecedented seven times during his career. He was also noted for his important reforms of Roman armies, authorizing recruitment of landless citizens, eliminating the manipular military formations, and reorganizing the structure of the legions into separate cohorts. Marius defeated the invading Germanic tribes , for which he was called "the third founder of Rome." His life and career were significant in Rome's transformation from Republic to Empire

January 27, 98

Nerva
Roman Emperor from 96 to 98.
Nerva became Emperor at the age of sixty-five, after a lifetime of imperial service under Nero and the rulers of the Flavian dynasty. Under Nero, he was a member of the imperial entourage and played a vital part in exposing the Pisonian conspiracy of 65. Later, as a loyalist to the Flavians, he attained consulships in 71 and 90 during the reigns of Vespasian and Domitian respectively

January 1, 138

Lucius Aelius
Caesar became the adopted son and intended successor of Roman Emperor Hadrian , but never attained the throne.
Aelius was born with the name Lucius Ceionius Commodus, and later called Lucius Aelius Caesar. He is often mistakenly referred to as Lucius Aelius Verus, though this name is not attested outside the Augustan History and probably arose as a manuscript error

January 3, 236

Pope Anterus
the Bishop of Rome from 21 November 235 to his death in 236.
He succeeded Pope Pontian, who had been deported from Rome to Sardinia, along with the antipope Hippolytus

January 22, 239

Cao Rui
the second emperor of the state of Cao Wei during the Three Kingdoms period.
His parentage is in dispute: his mother, Lady Zhen, was Yuan Xi's wife, but she later remarried Cao Pi, the first ruler of Wei. Pei Songzhi claimed that Cao Rui was Cao Pi's son, but Lu Bi and Mou Guangsheng stated that he was Yuan Xi's son

January 20, 250

Pope Fabian
the Bishop of Rome from 10 January 236 to his death in 250, succeeding Anterus.
He is famous for the miraculous nature of his election, in which a dove is said to have descended on his head to mark him as the Holy Spirit's unexpected choice to become the next pope. He was succeeded by Cornelius

January 10, 300

Pope Theonas of Alexandria
16th Pope of Alexandria & Patriarch of the See of Mark.

January 8, 307

Emperor Hui of Jin
the second emperor of the Jin Dynasty.
Emperor Hui was a developmentally disabled ruler, and throughout his reign, there was constant internecine fighting between regents, imperial princes , and his wife Empress Jia Nanfeng for the right to control him , causing great suffering for the people and greatly undermining the stability of the Jin regime, eventually leading to Wu Hu rebellions that led to Jin's loss of northern and central China and the establishment of the competing Sixteen Kingdoms. He was briefly deposed by his granduncle Sima Lun, who usurped the throne himself, in 301, but later that year was restored to the throne and continued to be the emperor until 307, when he was poisoned, likely by the regent Sima Yue

January 16, 309

Pope Marcellus I
the Bishop of Rome or Pope from May or June 308 to his death in 309.
He succeeded Pope Marcellinus after a considerable interval. Under Maxentius, he was banished from Rome in 309, on account of the tumult caused by the severity of the penances he had imposed on Christians who had lapsed under the recent persecution. He died the same year, being succeeded by Pope Eusebius. His relics are under the altar of San Marcello al Corso in Rome. His third-class feast day is kept on January 16

January 7, 312

Lucian of Antioch
a Christian presbyter, theologian and martyr.
He was noted for both his scholarship and ascetic piety

January 10, 314

Pope Miltiades
Bishop of Rome from 2 July 311 to his death in 314.

January 3, 323

Emperor Yuan of Jin
an emperor of the Jin Dynasty and the first of the Eastern Jin.
His reign saw the steady gradual loss of Jin territory in the north, but entrenchment of Jin authority south of the Huai River and east of the Three Gorges, and for generations Jin was not seriously threatened by Wu Hu kingdoms to the north

January 25, 389

Gregory of Nazianzus
a 4th-century Archbishop of Constantinople.
He is widely considered the most accomplished rhetorical stylist of the patristic age.:xxi As a classically trained orator and philosopher he infused Hellenism into the early church, establishing the paradigm of Byzantine theologians and church officials.:xxiv

January 17, 395

Theodosius I
Roman Emperor from 379 to 395.
Theodosius was the last emperor to rule over both the eastern and the western halves of the Roman Empire. On accepting his elevation, he campaigned against Goths and other barbarians who had invaded the Empire; he failed to kill, expel, or entirely subjugate them, and after the Gothic War they established a homeland south of the Danube, in Illyricum, within the empire's borders. He fought two destructive civil wars, in which he defeated the usurpers Magnus Maximus and Eugenius at great cost to the power of the Empire

January 1, 404

Saint Telemachus
a monk who, according to the Church historian Theodoret, tried to stop a gladiatorial fight in a Roman amphitheatre, and was stoned to death by the crowd.
The Christian Emperor Honorius, however, was impressed by the monk's martyrdom and it spurred him to issue a historic ban on gladiatorial fights. The last known gladiatorial fight in Rome was on 1 January 404 AD, so this is usually given as the date of Telemachus' martyrdom

January 21, 420

Yazdegerd I
the fourteenth Sasanian king of Persia and ruled from 399 to 420.
He was the son of Shapur III. He succeeded to the Sasanian throne on the assassination of his brother Bahram IV in 399 and ruled for twenty-one years till his death in 420

January 6, 429

Honoratus
an early Archbishop of Arles, who was also the Abbot of Lérins Abbey.
He is honored as a saint in the Catholic Church

January 27, 457

Marcian
Byzantine Emperor from 450 to 457.
Marcian's rule marked a recovery of the Eastern Empire, which the Emperor protected from external menaces and reformed economically and financially. On the other side, the isolationistic policies of Marcian left the Western Roman Empire without help against barbarian attacks, which materialized in the Italian campaigns of Attila and in the Vandal sack of Rome. The Eastern Orthodox Church recognizes Marcian as a saint for his role in convoking the Council of Chalcedon

January 20, 473

Euthymius the Great
an abbot in Palestine venerated in both Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox Churches.

January 18, 474

Leo I the Thracian
Byzantine Emperor from 457 to 474.
A native of Dacia Aureliana near historic Thrace, he was known as Leo the Thracian

January 25, 477

Genseric
King of the Vandals and Alans who established the Vandal Kingdom was one of the key players in the troubles of the Western Roman Empire in the 5th century.
During his nearly 50 years of rule, he raised a relatively insignificant Germanic tribe to the status of a major Mediterranean power — which, after he died, entered a swift decline and eventual collapse

January 8, 482

Severinus of Noricum
a Roman Catholic saint, known as the "Apostle to Noricum".
It has been speculated that he was born in either Southern Italy or in the Roman province of Africa. Severinus himself refused to discuss his personal history before his appearance along the Danube in Noricum, after the death of Attila in 453. However, he did mention experiences with eastern desert monasticism, and his vita draws connections between Severinus and Saint Anthony of Egypt

January 3, 492

Pope Felix III
Pope from 13 March 483 to his death in 492.
His repudiation of the Henoticon is considered the beginning of the Acacian schism

January 21, 496

Epiphanius of Pavia
Bishop of Pavia from 466 until his death in 496.
Epiphanius additionally held the offices of lector, subdeacon and deacon

January 1, 510

Eugendus
the fourth abbot of Condat Abbey, at Saint-Claude, Jura.
He was born at Izernore

January 1, 527

Fulgentius of Ruspe
bishop of the city of Ruspe, North Africa, in the 5th and 6th century and was canonized as a Christian saint.

January 13, 533

Saint Remigius
Bishop of Reims and Apostle of the Franks.
On 24 December 496 he baptised Clovis I, King of the Franks. This baptism, leading to the conversion of the entire Frankish people to Nicene Christianity, was a momentous success for the Catholic Church and a seminal event in European history

January 15, 570

Íte of Killeedy
an early Irish nun and patron saint of Killeedy.
She was known as the "foster mother of the saints of Erin". The name "Ita" was conferred on her because of her saintly qualities. Her feast day is 15 January

January 31, 579

Khosrau I
the successor of his father Kavadh I on the Sasanian Persian throne.
Khosrau I was the twenty-second Sasanian Emperor of Persia, and the most famous and celebrated of the Sasanian kings

January 4, 581

Ferréol of Uzès
bishop of Uzès and possibly bishop of Nîmes.
His Feast Day is January 4

January 15, 584

Saint Maurus
O.S.B.
was the first disciple of Benedict of Nursia. He is mentioned in Gregory the Great's biography of the latter as the first oblate; offered to the monastery by his noble Roman parents as a young boy to be brought up in the monastic life. Four stories involving Maurus recounted by Gregory formed a pattern for the ideal formation of a Benedictine monk. The most famous of these involved Maurus's rescue of Saint Placidus, a younger boy offered to Benedict at the same time as Maurus. The incident has been reproduced in many medieval and Renaissance paintings

January 28, 592

Guntram
the king of Burgundy from 561 to 592.
He was a son of Chlothar I and Ingunda. On his father's death , he became king of a fourth of the kingdom of the Franks, and made his capital at Orléans

January 13, 614

Saint Mungo
the late 6th-century apostle of the Britonnic Kingdom of Strathclyde, the founder and patron saint of the city of Glasgow.

January 22, 628

Anastasius of Persia
martyred in 628.

January 31, 632

Máedóc of Ferns
an Irish saint, founder and first bishop of Ferns in County Wexford and a patron of other churches, such as Rossinver in County Leitrim and Drumlane in County Cavan.

January 19, 639

Dagobert I
the king of Austrasia , king of all the Franks , and king of Neustria and Burgundy.
He was the last king of the Merovingian dynasty to wield any real royal power. Dagobert was the first of the Frankish kings to be buried in the royal tombs at Saint Denis Basilica

January 20, 640

Eadbald of Kent
King of Kent from 616 until his death in 640.
He was the son of King Æthelberht and his wife Bertha, a daughter of the Merovingian king Charibert. Æthelberht made Kent the dominant force in England during his reign and became the first Anglo-Saxon king to convert to Christianity from Anglo-Saxon paganism. Eadbald's accession was a significant setback for the growth of the church, since he retained his indigenous paganism and did not convert to Christianity for at least a year, and perhaps for as much as eight years. He was ultimately converted by either Laurentius or Justus, and separated from his first wife, who had been his stepmother, at the insistence of the church. Eadbald's second wife was Emma, who may have been a Frankish princess. She bore him two sons, Eormenred and Eorcenberht, and a daughter, Eanswith

January 16, 654

Gao Jifu
a chancellor of the Chinese court in the Tang Dynasty, during the reigns of Emperor Taizong and Emperor Gaozong.

January 16, 662

Pope Benjamin I of Alexandria
38th Pope of Alexandria & Patriarch of the See of Mark.
He is regarded as one of the greatest patriarchs of the Coptic Church. Benjamin guided the Coptic church through a period of turmoil in Egyptian history that included the fall of Egypt to the Sassanid Empire, followed by Egypt's reconquest under the Byzantines, and finally the Arab Islamic Conquest in 642. After the Arab conquest Pope Benjamin, who was in exile, was allowed to return to Alexandria and resume the patriarchate

January 23, 667

Ildefonsus
a scholar and theologian who served as the metropolitan bishop of Toledo for the last decade of his life.
His Gothic name was Hildefuns. Although his writings were less influential outside of Hispania, Ildefonsus was canonised and remained a potent force in the peninsula for centuries. Spanish and Portuguese missionaries spread his cult worldwide

January 7, 672

Emperor Tenji
the 38th emperor of Japan, according to the traditional order of succession.

January 27, 672

Pope Vitalian
reigned from 30 July 657 to his death in 672.
He was born in Segni, Lazio, the son of Anastasius

January 1, 680

Javanshir
the prince of Caucasian Albania from 637 to 680, hailing from the region of Gardman.
His life and deeds were the subject of legends that were recorded in Armenian medieval texts. He was either of Parthian or Persian origin, as the Mihranid family claimed descent from the Sasanian Persians

January 30, 680

Balthild
the wife and queen of Clovis II, the king of Burgundy and Neustria.
Her hagiography was intended to further her successful candidature for sainthood

January 10, 681

Pope Agatho
Pope from 26 June 678 to his death in 681.
He is venerated as a saint by both Catholic and Eastern Orthodox churches. Little is known of Agatho before his papacy

January 12, 690

Benedict Biscop
an Anglo-Saxon abbot and founder of Monkwearmouth-Jarrow Priory and was considered a saint after his death.

January 29, 702

Princess Ōku
a Japanese princess during the Asuka period in Japanese history.
She was the daughter of Emperor Temmu and sister of Prince Ōtsu. As a young girl, she witnessed the Jinshin War. According to the Man'yōshū , she became the first Saiō to serve at Ise Grand Shrine. After the death of her brother in 686, she returned from Ise to Yamato to enshrine his remains on Futakami, before a quiet end to her life at age 40

January 13, 703

Empress Jitō
the 41st monarch of Japan, according to the traditional order of succession.